Oil paint has exceptional properties: it gives colours solidity, lustre and depth, while its transparency makes wonderful glazes. I also use acrylic colour for its iridescence and metallic qualities, and its magical capacity to change or enhance overlying colours depending on the play of light on the picture, or the position of the viewer. I use gels textured with glass, cement, sand or crushed garnet and gesso in order to build a painting’s underlying structure. Many of the paintings are created by a process of building up and scraping back layers of paint. Pouring liquid glazes onto the canvas forces me to work with complete spontaneity. Some works may also be embellished with crystal jewels, beads, pearls, metal disks or tiny shells.

My environment has always inspired me, whether rural or urban. I love untamed nature, craggy rocks and bleak moors. I find myself fascinated and moved by crumbling plaster walls that reveal the bones of a building and bear its human history in marks and faded paint. This interplay between man and nature often finds its way into my work. I do not usually intend the paintings to be figurative but they are often completed and given meaning by the viewer’s imagination. I may be inspired by a storm, a mountain, or a love affair – or possibly all three.

I have recently been exploring the idea of the Dream Painting, recalling the sensation of watching the sky with the mind free to create images in the cloud patterns. I tend to look for hope and redemption by celebrating beauty in its various forms, be it in urban decay, a Hebridean storm, or a butterfly’s wing.